Australia records first diphtheria fatality in almost a decade after person dies in the NT

Australia has recorded its first death from the deadly diphtheria disease in almost a decade, a public health official has announced

John Boffa, a public medical officer at the Central Australian Aboriginal Congress, told the ABC that an individual has died from the bacterial infection in the Northern Territory.

Dr Boffa said the deceased had been living in a remote part of the NT and had died within the past few weeks.

The reported death is the first fatal case of diphtheria in Australia since 2018, according to data published by the Australian Centre for Disease Control.

A deadly bacterial infection, diphtheria has the capacity to spread quickly between cases.

However, its spread in recent decades has been carefully contained through successful vaccination programs – with the 2018 death reported to have been an unvaccinated adult who contracted respiratory diphtheria.

In recent weeks, though, public health bosses in the NT reported the state’s first outbreak of the illness since the 1990s.

Dr Boffa said that the NT had recently seen more than 100 cases of respiratory and cutaneous diphtheria, which had resulted in some patients requiring admission to intensive care.

And he said the majority of those who were becoming “seriously sick” were either unvaccinated or had missed their booster window.

He told ABC: “It’s a tried and proven and effective vaccine – it is the way we will get on top of this outbreak.”

The most recent figures showed 161 people testing positive for diphtheria nationwide – with cases also reported in Western Australia, Queensland and South Australia.

The infection was a previously a common cause of death among Australian children, but it became increasingly rare following the rollout of a vaccine in the 1940s.

Dr Boffa added: “We have clinics which are struggling anyway to deliver routine primary healthcare.

“We don’t want to have to divert essential primary healthcare resources into this, but right now we have to because we don’t have a surge workforce or additional resources.

“We don’t want to be taking three or four years to get boosters into people’s arms – we need to get it done quickly.

“People need to be aware that this is a potentially life-threatening disease and they need to get boosted.”

A spokesman for NT Health said the organisation was still awaiting results from a post mortem examination to confirm the reported death was related to diphtheria.

“There have been 145 cases of diphtheria reported in the Northern Territory between January 1, 2025 and May 14, 2026. This includes 42 respiratory cases and 104 cutaneous cases,” the spokesman said.

“Vaccination remains the most-important measure for preventing, protecting and reducing transmission.”